Titchfield Haven and Hill Head

Off to Hill Head/Tichfield Haven today to do some bird watching. Been told that there were a couple of Spoonbills at Tichfield there during the week and so was hoping that they will still going to be there. They were!! :) A new one on my life list. However the Roseate Tern that’s been at Hill Head wasn’t there when we were, though I understand that it was there later. However there was some Common Terns, Little Terns and two Sandwich Terns. The latter two being added to my life list and the first one to my 2007 list. It turned out to be a good day for the lists. Another 17 for my Hampshire List, most of which were Life Listers as well.. Though I upset that the great looking Bar-Headed Goose doesn’t count. It’s an escapee. Oh well can’t win them all.

In a way it was nice to have quite a few experienced bird-watchers in the first hide. Listening in to their conversations helped us spot the birds. However by the end the day we were on our own in some of the hides which was great. Good to spend some quality time together.

Money, Band and Robocop

I’m going through a ‘fed up of having no money all the time so lets do something about it’ phase at the moment. So trying to think up way to make/save money. I no longer get a cup of coffee from the vending machine on the way into work each day anymore. That saves me 20p a day. Well it’s a start. On the making money front I’ve added a link to YouGov in my list of links on the right of this page. They were recommended to me by a Geocahcing friend. Basically you sign up. They send you surveys which take a few mins to complete about once a week or so. With the majority of surveys paying 50p for each completed one. Once you get to £50 you’ll get a cheque in the post. OK at 50p a time it does take quite a few years to get to £50, but for a few mins a week I think it will be worth it. You can boost your earnings by recruiting friends, hence me putting the link on my blog.

Band practice last night. Good fun. I feel that I’m getting better but realize that there is so much I’ve still got to learn and a huge amount of practice I need to get things sounding good. Also there is the need to sit down and totally learn the songs. Yes I know the songs, but I’m talking down to a level where I know each beat of each bar. This will help with fills and knowing when I should be changing the pattern that I’m playing.

Having a bit of a sort out of stuff at home. Got boxes in loft, cupboard and under work surfaces that haven’t been touched for ages. Wanting to go through them all and sort out what we can sell, what we want to keep etc Sorting out our books and videos as well. Listed some of the books on the excellent readitswapit web site. Where you can swap books that you’ve already read, for books that you haven’t. Sue typed out a list of videos we don’t want and I’ll put it on our Intranet at work and try and sell them. Anyone want all three Robocop films???

Football, Popham and next years trip

Well another weekend gone and a busy one it was. Saturday was off to football. One all draw, though the ref denied us a definite penalty. Worrying though is that two of our players had to be stretchered* off.

Home in the evening watching TV. Nice

Sunday was another Popham. This time the Solent Aviation Society Fly-in. One or two nice aircraft. Sales were good, glad that we sold quite a few book, thus making our boxes lighter. Saw Eric and Lynne from Aeroprints Tours. They are the company that I do my plane spotting trips with. Now I had booked up to go to Shawbury with them later this month, but due to a course I’m having to go on for work I can’t make it. I initially told them to put the money from that tour towards a trip to Ireland that they are doing in August next year. However seeing his new brochure (or book of dreams as Sue calls it) I noticed that the trip to Austria next September is only £100 more and you get twice as long. Also I’ve done Ireland before, where as I’ve never been to Austria. One of the few Western European countries I haven’t been too. Plus the trip also includes a visit to the World Hot Air Balloon Championships, which should be good. On the down side is that I’ll be away for over a week, the longest Sue and I would have been away since started going out with each other. Also it won’t be the same to go to a balloon festival without her, but there is no way that she’ll stand all the coach travel etc.

*Typing this blog in word on the train heading for work. It says that I’ve miss-spelt stretchered, but won’t give me the proper spelling. Now surely stretchered is just stretcher (which is spelt correctly) with an ed at the end. Isn’t it???

Time Management

Well the roofers and scaffolding has gone, but the Council bod has said that there might be a problem. Read all about it on Sue’s blog.

Another Popham Fly-in last Sunday. Didn’t sell that much on the stall but there was some nice aircraft there.

Did a time management course yesterday. They had someone else booked on it but for some reason unknown to me they could attend. So to avoid paying a cancellation fee they asked around for anyone wanting to go on it. I said that I was willing, but on finding out that it was in Creekmoor, I said that I couldn’t go due to lack of car. Next-to-top manager agreed to pay for my train ticket from Bournemouth to Poole and then taxi’s to/from the venue. Which I’m sure will come to more that the cancellation fee but there you go. On arrival at the venue I noticed that there was a bus stop right out side the place, So I decided to save the council some money and catch the bus back to Poole. Wasn’t that good of me!

The course started off OK. The morning session was good, learning about Alan Leikens 6 point road to time management happiness. The 80/20 rule etc. Then in the afternoon we seem to drift off topic a lot and started talking about delegation etc (Stuff I’ve done on my first line management course) So the afternoon was a bit of a waste of time.

Rushing around this morning as per usual, getting ready to leave and try to get to the station in time for my train. Sue was still in bed and commented that my time management first thing in the morning hasn’t improved. I advised her that I had done a ‘to do list’ yet. She jumped at the chance to help me with that.. Thanks for the offer but NO!!!!

Geocaching and rehab

Last Saturday went to football for my first home game of the season. Got a new system there for us Matchday Draw Ticket sellers (and the programme sellers too). Basically we are not on commission anymore, but a flat rate no matter how many tickets/programmes we sell. Whilst we all do try our best, I don’t think any of us will bend over backwards to try and increase sales like we used to.

Went to check on my Ziegler Passage geocache recently. I made the cache a virtual one about 3 years ago after checking on it and finding that the original box was missing. Anyway after someone reported finding the box a few weeks and we thought we’d go and check. Sure enough there it was. We even remember some of the items we’d put in it. I guess it would be nice to make it a proper cache again.

On the walk down to the cache spotted a bird neither Sue and I had seen before. Made a mental note of it and looked it up when we got home. Turned out to be a Wheater. That’s a new one on my life list.

Football again on Tuesday and we finally scored a goal at home this season. If fact we scored two and had our first home victory of the season.

Apart from that nothing much to report. Still got a bad cough, which only seems to effect me at night… (sorry Sue for keeping you awake). I’ll spare you the gory details of my infected finger, just to say its on the mend. Its amazing that it is not until you have a middle finger that is painful to touch, that you realise how often you use it.

Oh have donw more work on the family tree. Found details of great great grandpents on my mum’s mum side. Also found another two people who are possible living relatives.

Final note is to pass on my very best wishes to my mate Henry The Thirst… Let’s hope you can go back to being Hentry Not The Thirst after you come out of rehab.